- So in the last month, San Diego county hospitals
have seen fewer patients with serious,
and sometimes life-threatening conditions
coming into the hospital Emergency Departments
and the Urgent Care centers due to concerns
about contracting COVID-19.
So, joining us now to talk more about this issue
is the Chief Medical Officer and Clinical Excellence
and Experience, for Scripps Health,
is Doctor Ghazala Sharieff.
Good to see you, doctor.
How are you?
- [Dr. Sharieff] I'm great, thanks for having me on.
- It's our pleasure!
You know, I've spoken to my family and friends about this.
We say things like, "Make sure you don't get into
"a car accident or slip and fall."
"Don't cut your fingers, cutting the vegetables,
"because the last thing you wanna to is go into
"an emergency room or something like that,
"where potentially people have COVID-19."
But this can be really serious, right?
If there's somebody who's maybe having a heart-attack
or a life-threatening illness.
- [Dr. Sharieff] Yep, absolutely though.
You pegged it right away.
I'm very concerned about the volume.
We expected some of this, as you know.
As you said, people are not going out
and driving as much, so we're not seeing any car accidents.
But, our concern is the patients who do have chest pain
or stroke symptoms, if they're waiting to come in,
time is literally ticking away and so if they wait,
that could be a devastating outcome.
- [Byrnes] So, what do you tell them
to encourage them to go to the Urgent Care,
to go to the ER if they're having an issue like that?
What are you doing to protect them?
- [Dr. Sharieff] That's a great question.
We're being very careful.
You may have seen that we have triage tents
outside our Emergency Departments
and our Urgent Care centers.
So, we're separating the respiratory symptoms
from everybody else.
They get screened, they get mask put on them
if they have respiratory complaints.
So we're being very careful
about separating our patients out.
And our staff has been wearing protective gear as well,
including a mask and face shield.
So it's very safe in our Emergency Departments
and Urgent Care centers.
- [Byrnes] Yeah, we wanna make sure that the doctors
and the health care workers are safe as well.
Can you just take me through what
the actual process would be if somebody's at home
and maybe they're having an issue breathing
or chest compressions.
Do they call ahead, wait in the parking lot, put a mask on?
How does it work step-by-step?
- [Dr. Sharieff] So, if you're having severe symptoms,
that you've just described,
you're having severe difficulty breathing,
severe chest pain, radiation down your arm,
you really shouldn't drive yourself, right?
That's a 9-1-1 call.
And I can assure you that the paramedics
are doing a very good job as well,
of protecting their patients and their staff as well.
So, that would be a 9-1-1 call.
If you're not having severe symptoms
and you're wondering, "Should I go in?" or
"Should I not go in?"
You can definitely go to our website.
You can call in.
We have a nurse triage line as well.
Or you can call your doctor's office if it's
not a medical emergency.
But I do think getting care with 9-1-1
if you're having severe symptoms is actually very important.
- [Byrnes] Sure, the last thing you want somebody to do
is just walk into the hospital, I would think.
I know you've got those tents set outside
and they should probably wear a mask.
At least do something like that so they could be isolated
from other people who maybe have COVID-19.
- [Dr. Sharieff] Yeah, I really appreciate you saying that.
I think what you said was very important
that we're asking our patients to wear a mask as well.
It's for their protection and actually for the other people
that they're interacting with.
But yes, you're right.
If you're a walk-in patient,
we will automatically triage you.
Again, separating you out
if you respiratory concerns at all.
But yes, wearing a mask,
and then our staff is wearing a mask as well.
- [Byrnes] We've done a number of stories
on this TeleHealth, where you can speak to a doctor
through your cellphone or your computer.
When would that come into play?
- That's a great question as well.
If you're having symptoms that you're not sure of,
and you really are in severe symptoms, that's a 9-1-1 call.
But if you're not sure, and actually it's for our patients
who have chronic medical illnesses.
So you have known cardiac disease
and you're not sure whether or not to go in,
that's a great time to contact your doctor's office.
And they might be able to set you up for a Tele visit.
You may not even need to come in.
But we definitely don't want those patients
to skip an appointment.
Because you skip one appointment, you may not get
your medications refilled.
And then you do set yourself up for getting sicker.
And then you have to go to the Emergency Department
because you haven't taken care of your disease
along the way.
So, contacting your physician's office is a great start.
And then, we can direct you as to whether
a Tele medicine visit would help or
if you really need to be seen in person.
- [Byrnes] How is Scripps doing with having enough
of the PPE, the masks, the gowns, the face shields,
ventilators, beds?
How are you guys doing in that regard?
- [Dr. Sharieff] We're doing okay right now.
We anticipated a surge was going to be coming,
so we cut down elective surgery.
So they said the non-essential elective surgery,
so we have bed capacity.
We are seeing increased volume in the south as well,
and so that's something we're keeping an eye on.
Currently, we have enough PPEs, but we are short
on isolation gowns, just like everybody else is.
And so we actually just put in our re-sterilization process
for our N95 masks.
We only hope to use those if we run out of the N95s.
But right now we're okay.
But, everything is being watched critically, as you know.
Because the supply changes day-to-day.
- [Byrnes] Dr. Ghazala Sharieff, from Scripps.
We appreciate it!
Thank you, Doctor!
All the best!
Stay safe out there!
- [Dr. Sharieff] Okay, you too!
Thank you very much!